After 10 hours of debate, 27 amendments and a short-lived filibuster, the Colorado House of Representatives abruptly broke off debate on the state budget proposal just before 11 p.m. Thursday, delaying a vote until the next morning.

In the marathon debate, the House took preliminary votes to spend millions of dollars to combat homelessness, increase funding for substance abuse treatment and restore a controversial film-industry incentive program.

And on the day U.S. Senate Republicans invoked the “nuclear option” to abolish the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees, Colorado House Republicans staged something akin to a filibuster of their own. Through a procedural move, state Rep. Dave Williams, R-Colorado Springs, forced a clerk to read the 600-plus page budget bill aloud, effectively derailing the debate just after 8 p.m.

Democrats accused Williams of throwing a “temper tantrum,” while his fellow Republicans defended the maneuver, saying Democrats had been using procedural moves of their own to stifle debate on two Williams amendments: one to defund colleges that traffic in aborted fetus parts and another to defund so-called “sanctuary cities” that don’t enforce federal immigration law.

But even with 93 proposed amendments — 27 of which were adopted Thursday — the $26.8 billion spending plan was not expected to change significantly from the version passed last month by the Senate. Even before the filibuster — which lasted about 30 minutes — House Democrats, who control the chamber, spent the vast majority of the day on defense, beating back dozens of Republican amendments to boost funding to roads and schools by cutting a slew of other state programs.

Lawmakers in both parties entered Thursday’s debate unhappy with the proposed budget, which — despite growing by 4 percent from this year — was balanced through deep cuts to hospitals and by under-funding schools by an estimated $50 million. But a majority in both chambers have appeared willing to support it in the hope that the state can address its transportation needs and restore funding to hospitals through other bills still pending before the legislature.

“There are some major shortfalls in this budget as we’ve presented,” said state Rep. Millie Hamner, the top Democratic budget writer. ” … It isn’t going to work unless these other measures prevail.”

From the outset of Thursday’s debate, House Republicans made it clear that they would use the exercise to make a political point about how the state funds its roads and schools relative to other programs. The failed attempts to divert funding included a $13.9 million cut from school testing, a slew of cuts to Medicaid that included increasing co-pays and eliminating coverage for adults without children, and an across-the-board cut of a number of state government agencies that would have sent an additional $314 million to schools.

Speaking on one proposed cut, Assistant Minority Leader Cole Wist likened the growth of state government over the years to “empire building” and said it was time to make difficult decisions about what programs to cut.

“It’s time for us to start having these discussions, when we don’t have money to fund transportation or education and then wonder why we don’t have money,” said Wist, R-Centennial. “It’s time to funnel the money to the principle functions that our government should be doing.”

Democrats beat back each of the most significant Republican proposals, with House Speaker Crisanta Duran, D-Denver, denouncing the cuts to Medicaid as an attempt to fund roads “on the backs of the sick.”

Democrats also added funding for a pair of Gov. John Hickenlooper’s priorities — a $16 million grant program for housing to help the homeless and $1.5 million for film industry incentives that his office says creates jobs and boosts tourism. That’s half of the $3 million he initially requested for the program, which has been in place since 2012.

In a rare bipartisan accord, lawmakers also tapped the state’s marijuana sales tax funds to devote $8 million to substance abuse treatment.

The Senate already agreed to the money to assist the homeless, but it’s not clear whether the film incentives program or the substance abuse funding will stay in the budget when it heads to conference committee to reconcile the differences.

The dust-up over Williams’ filibuster was short-lived; with as many as 11 people reading simultaneously from different places, House staffers dispatched with exercise in about 30 minutes. But tempers flared in the immediate aftermath. Rep. Joe Salazar, D-Thornton, accused the freshman lawmaker of throwing a “temper tantrum.”

“It seems like your nuclear option is pitching a fit,” he added.

But Rep. Justin Everett, R-Littleton, defended the move as necessary to protect the right of the minority to debate its priorities.

“This isn’t a temper tantrum,” Everett said. “This is a valid use of the rules.”

By adjourning around 11 p.m. before taking a vote on second reading, the House delayed what was expected to be hours of additional debate during the committee of the whole report, which effectively would have triggered a second phase of amendments. The delay means the House can’t pass the budget on final adoption until Monday at the earliest.

Statehouse reporter Brian Eason joined The Post from the Indianapolis Star, where he covered city hall for the news outlet's watchdog team beginning in 2014. Before that, he was an investigative reporter at The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Miss., and covered local government at The Leaf-Chronicle in Clarksville, Tenn. He graduated in 2009 from the University of Missouri with degrees in journalism and political science.

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